324 - Hmph

Either the rapture didn't happen yesterday, or - as I have suspected all along - people on the road are so evil that the rapture did happen and none of them left. Was really hoping for some elbow room out there...

My tomatoes are finally starting to put out. The bigger, more exotic tomatoes are taking their time, but the four that sprang up on their own are very prolific so far. At this point about ten tomatoes have ripened up. Only four survived. I ate the rest... *evil laugh* Can't wait to taste my first Cherokee Chocolate, Black Krim, and Blue tomatoes. Yum.

Starting to look at land in earnest. Mike and I are both eager to get started on the next chapter of our lives, it's just a matter of finding the right place. In some ways I would prefer to build, but it takes longer. And land without a home on it requires a larger down payment, has a shorter repayment term, and a higher interest rate. With a home we can go conventional... less than 5% APR for 30 years with a one downpayment. And we don't have to deal with the headaches of building a house. On the other hand, building a home gives you creative license, and that can be exciting. It just seems like it would be overwhelming, and in the meantime we'd have to live in a doublewide or something - which is fine, but it's an added expense. Don't know what's going to happen. We've seen some really nice properties, they're just exorbitantly priced or too far west. (I don't want to be ass to elbows with Mexico)

I took a couple of days off from work to get my head together and that really helped me. All of my friends (blog friends included) were wonderful, they gave me space but were there if I wanted to talk. Only one person hugged me, but she waited until I was ready (which I know was hard for her because she's the first to give you hugs when you have a bad day). During my time off I took care of some things I had been putting off... I slept in... basically took some me time and didn't push myself to do anything.

Even though he wasn't physically here, Mike was always there for me, and that helped me enormously. Poor thing, he is 9-1/2 hours ahead of me so sometimes I get a message from him and realize he's up at 3 or 4 in the morning. He has a way of calming me down and giving me perspective about things. We've figured out what our next steps are going to be, but I have realized that we were (okay, I was) too open with everyone about things, and for my own sake I have realized that I need to keep things to myself. So I can't tell you if we're going to try again, give up, or let nature take its course at this point. It's hard for me to keep secrets when they're my own secrets, so this is going to be a challenge for me, but I think it's for the best.

I'll leave you with good news. I bought one of these so I wouldn't have to scoop cat litter anymore. Healthier for me, healthier for the cats, no more scooping or lugging boxes of litter home from the store. I was happy, happy, happy...

It was such a pain in the ass because the tube where the wastes go down the drain would NOT fit down the laundry drain with my washer hose, and I don't have enough room in my bathroom to put it there (plus I like it being in the garage). My next door neighbor suggested clear, flexible plastic tubing, so when I finally got the right size, that worked great. Then it was a matter of getting the cats to use it. Took Gracie a few days, but now I usually see poop in the bowl. She makes me so proud. Daphne, on the other hand... she's special. I tossed one of the litter boxes so there was only one left, and I haven't scooped it in almost two weeks. I put it right next to the cat genie as if to say, 'nasty litterbox... clean litterbox... your choice' and she insisted on using the nasty litterbox. Finally, this morning I saw her poop in there with Gracie's. *dance of joy* A few more days of that and I can toss the other litterbox!!! Woot!!!